Policy for the dropbear.id.au domain

Purpose

The main purpose of the id.au
zone (and also dropbear.id.au
within it), is to enable individuals to register domain names
which may remain constant over a long period of time (eg: 5-10
years).

The domain (and the individuals' E-mail address within it)
should still be usuable without change even if individuals
change network providers (ISPs), use a different machine for
Internet access, change jobs, or move interstate (or even
overseas, if they choose to retain an Australian identity).

Restrictions

Existing domains that do not meet the following restrictions may be
disabled. Applications that do not meet the following restrictions will
not be approved.

Applicants must be a residents of Australia or a citizens of Australia.
Once domain names are granted, applicants may continue to use them
even if they cease to be residents or citizens of Australia.

dropbear.id.au domains are for personal use only,
and will not be granted to organizations of any kind.
Larger groups of individuals are requested to submit separate
applications. This is to maximise the chances of achieving one of the
major goals of the id.au domain :- that individuals
may use the same E-mail address unchanged for many years.
The only situations where a dropbear.id.au domain can
be used as part of an email address by anyone other than the domain
holder are:

A household shares the same email server, and are unable to
configure it to accept email to multiple domains.

A temporary email account is set up for a friend or
relative. No charge of any kind can be made for this account.

An individual can only maintain a single domain in id.au.

Domains will never be deleted. If a domain needs to be disabled,
it will be replaced with TXT entries in the DNS database.

An individual can only get a new domain if the original domain name was
based on the domain holder's real name (not a nickname or alias),
and the domain holder's name has been legally changed. The original
domain will be disabled after 6 months.

A dropbear.id.au domain holder must remain
responsible for their entire domain, and not allow delegations
of subdomains to anyone. If you have a need to do this, you should
be applying for your own third level id.au domain.

A dropbear.id.au domain holder must keep
their NIC information current. The dropbear.id.au
administrator relies on this information to be able to contact you.
The minimum required contact information is a valid email address
and a method of contact independant of the Internet (fax, phone number,
Postal Address etc.). Note that in dropbear.id.au,
this information is stored in a publicly accessible database (see
Privacy).

Requests for confirmation of contact details will be emailed at regular
intervals, at which time the domain holder should confirm their continued
existance. If no contact is made with a domain holder for twelve months,
the domain will be disabled until such time as the domain holder contacts
the dropbear.id.au administrator.

dropbear.id.au domains may not be bought, sold or
traded.

Domain names considered obscene or offensive by the administrator
of dropbear.id.au
<hostmaster@dropbear.id.au> will only be registered if
it matches one of the the applicant's legal names (no nicknames or
abreviations). Applicants in this situation may wish to consider changing
their names.

dropbear.id.au, unlike other id.au
domains, does not maintain its own database for contact information of
domain holders. Instead, this information is maintained through the
AUNIC Registration Services in the
same database used for most other second level au domains.

The information you supply to AUNIC is publicly
available!

It is possible to look up the contact details associated with your NIC
handle, and it is possible to find out your NIC handle by querying
your dropbear.id.au domain. People who dislike this
policy should obtain a domain in one of the other id.au
domains. The only contact information required for a
dropbear.id.au domain is a valid email address and
a method of contact independant of the Internet (phone, fax, postal address
etc.).

Note that this policy depends on the current policy of the AUNIC
registry. However, as one of the major functions of the AUNIC registry
is to allow people to look up domain controllers contact details
(eg. To phone them if email has been undeliverable for an extended period),
this is unlikly to change.

Charging

Registration in dropbear.id.au is currently free of
charge and shall remain free for the forseeable future. If it becomes
necessary to charge for registrations and modifications in the future,
existing dropbear.id.au domain holders will be
credited with three free modifications. If it becomes necessary for
a yearly charge, existing domain holders will be credited with five
years free of this change. Existing domain holders will be
notified via email if this happens.

Registration

Successful Applicants shall be granted a domain of their choice under
dropbear.id.au, provided that name is not already
taken and is not considered offensive or obscene by
<hostmaster@dropbear.id.au>.

Applicants are encouraged to use their surname (or an abbreviation
thereof) as the domain name, since that is quite unlikely to change
over time, whereas a favourite word may not be so favoured in five or
ten years time.

Registration and delegation of the domain will normally be completed
within seven days from receipt of a valid and complete application.

Applicants who disagree with, do not meet or do not plan to meet
the restrictions outlined above should apply for a domain elsewhere.
Individuals in this situation are free to apply for a domain elsewhere
in id.au.
Companies, educational institutions, government authorities, net-
work providers, associations and other miscellenous organisations are
requested to apply for a name within the appropriate domain heirarchy
within AU (com.au edu.au gov.au net.au asn.au
org.au).

Policies inherited from the id.au policy

dropbear.id.au is run by the administrator of
dropbear.id.au as an agent for the
id.au domain administrator (Robert Elz
<kre@munnari.oz.au>, at present).

While it is the dropbear.id.au administrator's
responsibility to ensure that this database is kept up-to-date, the
co-operation of registrants in the domain by informing the
administrator of any changes to their contact details would be highly
appreciated (For dropbear.id.au, this means keep your NIC handle updated
or your domain will get disabled after 12 months).

The terms of this policy shall not be varied substantially without
at least one month's notice (barring minor syntactic changes which do
not affect the meaning of the policy). In the case of a change, all
those registered in dropbear.id.au have the option of
continuing under the terms that were in affect at the time they
registered.

The dropbear.id.au domain may in future be "closed"
if the number of entries in the domain becomes excessive.

Should the dropbear.id.au administrator become
unable to continue providing a server for
dropbear.id.au, he will notify the id.au zone
administrator, and if possible to hand-over all relevant information to
a new zone administrator appointed by the id.au zone
administrator.

The dropbear.id.au administrator also agrees to
stand aside (and co-operate in handing over to a successor as above) if
the id.au zone administrator considers him not to be
keeping to the id.au policy in the administration of
dropbear.id.au and requests his resignation (so to
speak).